391–400 of 770 posts
Your whole blog resonates deeply with me. All this corporate grifting and women's empowerment months will do jack shit until we figure out how to make workplaces and lives more equitable for mothers and allowing for gaps, breaks and destigmatizing time off for parents of both genders. Instead, we talk about how sexism is the biggest problem. Sure, sexism might be annoying, but in the west, it is hardly something that…
> When I mention it to someone that I want to take time off for a couple years to have children in silicon valley, they look at me as if I'm an alien. As if wanting to be pregnant and not working at the same time as being sleep deprived and wanting to spend time with my own baby when they are at their youngest is some strange outlandish fantasy. And this happens way more than people lead on and for the exact BS reaso…
It's all around just awful to pit human biology against corporate norms.
And the parent commenter you responded to above really hit the nail on the head with the things women's rights activists have prioritized. Because activists are primarily based out of universities and urban centers, they are really pre-occupied with the wants/needs of 20 something women, and could give two shits about things outside of landing that sweet job at Google.
The effect on our society is insane. It's basically incredibly common now to encounter a stereotype:
The couple in their 40s with twins, often born premature, a consequence of IVF technology leading to incredibly high rates of multiple births.
My brother and I are identical twins, born before IVF was remotely affordable. Twins used to be rare. Now they are everywhere, and fit a certain demographic. It's absolutely twisted and toxic that workplace norms and cutthroat competition in said workplace have been allowed to remain static, and demanded that humans delay reproduction.
What a testament to how absolutely corrupt the feminist movement is that it looked at the Don Draper character in Mad Men, and concluded that their mission should be to create female Don Drapers, instead of challenging and upending whether ANYONE would want to be Don Draper.
Edit: Dang and other commenters correctly pointed out that I violated some HN norms in here and also my wording was poor and undermined my point. I'm leaving the above unedited for others to learn from my stupidity, and will clarify here:
I have zero problem with people having kids later in life. I only have a problem with people being FORCED to have kids later in life when they otherwise wouldn't have, due to inflexible and arbitrary corporate norms which were established for male only workplaces. (That forced decision was what I viewed as toxic) I'm a full advocate of women's rights as well, and my frustrations with feminism expressed above were intended to express my view that it didn't go far enough, and "settled", leaving women in a perpetually unfair position compared to men.
Your whole blog resonates deeply with me. All this corporate grifting and women's empowerment months will do jack shit until we figure out how to make workplaces and lives more equitable for mothers and allowing for gaps, breaks and destigmatizing time off for parents of both genders. Instead, we talk about how sexism is the biggest problem. Sure, sexism might be annoying, but in the west, it is hardly something that…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's really housing and then money only as a prerequisite to that. To start a family you need somewhere to live. When housing costs are insane you need crazy money to afford it, so everything becomes about money.
It's ridiculous how often people repeat this because they want to live in expensive areas. You don't really have to do that.
Of course, that doesn't mean we can't lower the COL of the Bay Area! Make Silicon Valley as dense as Tokyo, and I assure you rents will fall.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's crazy that a women doesn't get paid for raising kids Because she already collects a massive amount of utility associated with raising her own children. The economics of paying people to raise their own children doesn't make sense; the externality allocations are completely wrong. I'm sure you can imagine some of the perverse incentives that come into play. A woman benefits from raising her own kids (with an as…
> This arrangement has existed for at least thousands of years and is called "marriage". Well said. The modern inclination to tear down tradition institution and then replace them with increasingly more damaging and convoluted schemes is an endless source of confusion to me. It's almost if we've become so arrogant that we assume if something has been done for generations that it must be wrong, which seems like the ex…
The modern notion of traditional parenting is about 60 years old. Before that, things were much less straightforward, unless you were rich, because the absense of modern machinery and whatnot meant that that often both parents had to work.
Your whole blog resonates deeply with me. All this corporate grifting and women's empowerment months will do jack shit until we figure out how to make workplaces and lives more equitable for mothers and allowing for gaps, breaks and destigmatizing time off for parents of both genders. Instead, we talk about how sexism is the biggest problem. Sure, sexism might be annoying, but in the west, it is hardly something that…
> When I mention it to someone that I want to take time off for a couple years > actual equality where we acknowledge that women have different needs and desires I find your view sexist and disturbing. 99% men would love to take couple of years off with kids as well. But face even more obstacles!
"Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive."
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In other nations where the state provides good childcare women have historically entered the workforce just fine. It's the US (and especially California) that drains everything possible from young families.
And a good chunk of the women entering the workforce then work for the state providing childcare for other women's children.
Have you seen videos of orphaned animals that bond with stuffed toys or socks or whatever? Cue a DeepDream hallucination triggered by the word "ma-ma": The perfect supernormal stimulus for Baby. Even better than the Peppa Pig nightmare fuel you can already find on Youtube. Little Ash A-10 will be too absorbed to miss you in his cute CarePod.
As in, if a woman was to freeze some of her eggs in say, her 20's and desire to use them for IVF in her late 30's, is it still safe for her to have a child?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's really housing and then money only as a prerequisite to that. To start a family you need somewhere to live. When housing costs are insane you need crazy money to afford it, so everything becomes about money.
It's ridiculous how often people repeat this because they want to live in expensive areas. You don't really have to do that.
It's not a problem limited to "expensive areas" though it is dramatically worse there as a result of zoning restrictions on top of everything.
It's a problem caused by near-zero interest rates inflating housing prices everywhere.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, my mom always rebelled at the feminist push to have women do men's work as the goal (without valuing work women already did). Join the military, kill people etc. I'm 100% for that, but it's crazy that a women doesn't get paid for raising kids, perhaps the most important thing for society and with INCREDIBLE costs (if done badly) and benefits (if done well) to everyone. What's even more interesting, upvalue work…
> it's crazy that a women doesn't get paid for raising kids Are you suggesting that the father should pay the mother a salary for raising the kids? (Or same thing with the sexes reversed if it's the father raising the kid) Isn't that just a more formal arrangement of a stay-at-home mother/father? The main difference would be: more financial independence to the stay-at-home party, which is good in my book, but I'm not…